Susan J. Lambert

Processes Linking Work and Family: A Critical Review and Research Agenda

This paper critically reviews the theoreticalframeworks currently used to explain the processes through which work and family are linked, i.e., segmentation, compensation, and spillover. In the literature, these processes are treated as competing explanations, even though evidence and logic suggests that all three operate to link work and family. Moreover, it is likely that other processes also link the two. Most notably, workers may limit their involvement in work, or in family life, so that they can better accommodate the demands of the other. Clarified causal models and suggestions for advancing knowledge in this area are presented and discussed. It is argued that a fuller understanding of the processes linking work and family life is necessary to adequately evaluate the effectiveness of the family supportive policies currently being implemented by many U.S. firms, as well as to identify additional strategies for helping workers find satisfaction in both their work and personal roles.

Lower-Wage Workers and the New Realities of Work and Family

Changes in both social policy and business conditions make this a critical as well as an opportune time to extend a work family perspective to lower-wage workers and to organizations in the community that, in addition to the workplace, affect the well-being of low-income families. Drawing on literature from the fields of work and family, public policy, and organizational sociology, the author reviews what current research tells us about the special challenges that confront lower-wage workers as they combine work and family responsibilities. Integrating knowledge from these fields leads to concerns about current welfare-to-work efforts and opens up new avenues for improving the prospects of lower-wage workers and their families.

Schedule flexibility in hourly jobs: unanticipated consequences and promising directions

This article considers the challenge of extending conventional models of flexibility to hourly jobs that are often structured quite differently than the salaried, professional positions for which flexibility options were originally designed. We argue that the assumptions of job rigidity and overwork motivating existing flexibility options may not be broadly applicable across jobs in the US labor market. We focus specifically on two types of flexibility: (1) working reduced hours and (2) varying work timing. We first review central aspects of the US business and policy contexts that inspire our concerns, and then draw on original analyses from US census data and several examples from our comparative case-study research to explain how conventional flexibility options do not always map well onto hourly jobs, and in certain instances may disadvantage workers by undermining their ability to earn an adequate living. We conclude with a discussion of alternative approaches to implementing flexibility in hourly jobs when hours are scarce and fluctuating rather than long and rigid.

The organizational stratification of opportunities for work–life balance

As organizational scholars, we offer an ‘organizational stratification’ approach useful for revealing inequalities in the distribution of work–life ‘opportunities’ within and across jobs and workplaces. In doing so, we discuss the implications of historically narrow conceptualizations of workplace opportunity — typically focused on promotion only — and suggest a more expansive approach to theorizing, and in turn operationalizing, workplace opportunities essential to worker and family well‐being. We illustrate how researchers might employ an organizational stratification approach by describing an ongoing research project in which we differentiate opportunities ‘on paper’ from opportunities ‘in practice’ and examine variations in how US employers distribute work–life opportunities among lower‐skilled jobs. We demonstrate how an organizational stratification perspective can be useful for developing knowledge on the nature of inequality in the distribution of opportunities for work–life balance, and thus, for suggesting new avenues that enhance social justice in the workplace.

Unpredictable Work Timing in Retail Jobs

Unpredictability is a distinctive dimension of working time that has been examined primarily in the context of unplanned overtime and in male-dominated occupations. The authors assess the extent to which female employees in low-skilled retail jobs whose work schedules are unpredictable report greater work–life conflict than do their counterparts with more predictable work schedules and whether employee input into work schedules reduces work–life conflict. Data include measures from employee surveys and firm records for a sample of hourly female workers employed across 21 stores of a U.S. women’s apparel retailer. Results demonstrate that, independent of other dimensions of nonstandard work hours, unpredictability is positively associated with three outcomes: general work–life conflict, time-based conflict, and strain-based conflict as measured by perceived employee stress. Employee input into work schedules is negatively related to these outcomes. Little evidence was found that schedule input moderates the association between unpredictable working time and work–life conflict.

Workplace Policies as Social Policy

The rhetoric surrounding family-responsive policies in the workplace (e.g., employer-supported child care, parental leave, and employee-assistance programs) suggests that their purpose is to help workers achieve a healthy balance between work and family roles. The reality is, however, that many so-called family-responsive policies function as work supports to help ensure that workers continue to give priority to work over family. In this article, I reframe and clarify the goals of family-responsive policies. I examine these policies from a social policy perspective in order to identify new strategies for promoting a balanced life and to sort out the responsibilities of government, employers, and individuals in this emerging policy arena.

Lessons From the Policy World How the Economy, Work Supports, and Education Matter for Low-Income Workers

Work and employment scholars interested in jobs and workers at the lower end of the labor market have much to learn from a recent set of volumes authored by policy scholars. These volumes focus on how shifts in the macroeconomy, work supports, and postsecondary education affect the well-being of workers both on and off the job. This essay identifies some of the more subtle contributions of these volumes to knowledge on the nature of employment. It explains how many of the analyses could benefit, however, from additional consideration of the jobs low-earners perform. The essay concludes by offering specific suggestions for incorporating additional measures of job conditions into policy-relevant research.

The Work Side of Welfare-to-Work Lessons from Recent Policy Research

This review essay first discusses what we might learn about the nature of work and employment from scholars concerned with the recent changes in welfare legislation, changes that make childrens receipt of income support dependent on their parents work effort. It then considers the possible contributions that theory and research centered on jobs and workplaces might make to developing new policy strategies for moving families out of poverty. Economic and organizational accounts of the relationship between labor markets and the behavior of lower skilled workers are contrasted. The review considers why economists tend to take workplace and employer practices as givens, focusing on how to change workers rather than workplaces. It highlights the potential contribution that knowledge of firm-level labor markets may make to identifying new targets for policy analysis and development, specifically jobs and workplaces.

Work Schedule Flexibility: A Contributor to Employee Happiness?

This article contributes to knowledge regarding determinants of happiness by examining the independent role played by having discretion over one’s working time, using data pooled from two years of a nationally representative US survey. Controlling for a worker’s income bracket and work hours duration, having work schedule flexibility in the form of an ability to take time off during the work day and, to a somewhat lesser extent, to vary starting and quitting times daily, are both associated with greater happiness, whereas an ability to refuse overtime work is weak at best. The associations are generally stronger among workers paid by the hour than by salary. Worker utility functions thus may be enhanced by including the timing and flexibility of working time. Policies and practices that promote more employee-centered flexible working time may not only help workers alleviate work-life time conflicts, but also promote worker well-being generally, especially among hourly-paid workers.

Age, Wage, and Job Placement: Older Women’s Experiences Entering the Retail Sector

Older women seeking employment often find opportunities limited to low-wage jobs, such as those in retail. We report findings about job placement and starting wages for hourly workers hired at a women’s apparel retailer from August 2006 to December 2009. We examine competing hypotheses regarding the role of age in explaining women’s job placement and starting wages. Although newly hired women age 55+ earn higher wages and are placed in higher-quality jobs than the youngest women (ages 18–22), they are less likely to be placed in better-quality jobs than their midlife counterparts. Overall, wage differences are largely explained by job quality.